Difficult Daughters Read Free Page A

mother’s? Anywhere?
    ‘See how they are all running around like mad people between Amritsar and Dalhousie,’ she remarked to her husband as he lay on the takht in the angan, having his feet pressed by her.
    Chander Prakash twitched his head, but the silence continued.
    ‘How irresponsible to expect to be pampered like this,’ persisted Lajwanti. ‘Really, some women have no sense. They behave without thinking. I never let my ailments disturb anyone. Only God knew how I suffered.’
    Silence. Lajwanti pressed harder to jog her husband’s mind a bit. His eyes remained closed.
    ‘Your poor brother,’ she proceeded, ‘going every month to Dalhousie. In fixing his wife’s health he will ruin his own. All the burden of running the shop falls on you while he is away, but you are a saint and will never say anything about your own condition. Where do we, and our two children, stand in front of that woman, and her eleven children?’
    Chander Prakash muttered something unintelligible, and Lajwanti brooded over the strain of softness that ran through the men in her in-law’s family. Every month her poor brother-in-law made the long trip to Dalhousie. Train to Pathankot, tonga up, money, time and worry, all indulged in so frequently, what good could come of this? As for the children, she was fed up with their wild ways. Last night the cinema chowkidar brought one of the boys home on his shoulders. He had paid an anna to be let in, and had then fallen asleep in the theatre. And where had he found an anna to waste? She resolved to go with Suraj Prakash on his next visit, and let Kasturi know how matters stood. Her policy had always been to be frank and open.
    She approached her brother-in-law that evening. ‘Praji,’ she began as she handed him his glass of milk, ‘I worry about Pabiji. That my sister-in-law should do without her family at a time like this! There she is, with just Viru to look after her, bap re . We forget that Viru is still a child. But sitting here, what can I do? I feel so helpless, Praji. I must go with you next time in order to relieve her. I know how you worry, merely once a month as you see her. With an elderly woman staying there, you will get peace of mind.’
    *
     
    The cottage Lajwanti saw in Dalhousie increased her concern. She must stay as long as possible, to assist the invalid on her road to recovery. Besides, she herself also needed some rest occasionally.
    Suraj Prakash had written to Kasturi about Lajwanti’s anxiety about her health, and Kasturi had known that her sister-in-law had come to claim her own share of her lengthy stay at the hill station. She did not mind. Only Virmati objected, with a fierceness that she concealed by a great show of hospitality, and a refusal to let her tai help with Paro in any way.
    ‘Beti, I am here now, you rest,’ said Lajwanti frequently to her niece.

    ‘No, no, Taiji. You are here for a holiday‚’ said Virmati.
    ‘What holiday is it for you, beti, with your mother so sick and needing constant care.’
    Virmati was offended by this implication of herself as a pleasure-loving female, and did not reply. If Lajwanti was offended by her niece’s rudeness, she hid this fact. She did not want to initiate a longish stay, in a house her brother-in-law was paying for, with a quarrel.

IV
     
     
    Lajwanti stayed and stayed. She wrote to her daughter in Lahore. She too must come and visit – the climate was so nice, the house big enough, of course your cousin and aunt will be delighted, and you too, my child, need rest, you work so hard.
    She then broke the news to Kasturi and Virmati. Kasturi said what was required of her, Shakuntala was family, the house was hers, etc. Virmati asked listlessly, ‘How is Shaku Pehnji doing?’ And, since she was annoyed with her aunt, added with a touch of viciousness, ‘It will be so nice to see her, because when she settles down, we will meet her even less than we do now.’
    Normally few dared to mention